


thank god i'm yours

by bellawritess



Category: All Time Low (Band)
Genre: Cuddling, Fluff, Friendship/Love, LMAO, M/M, Romance, Stargazing, The Wake Up Sunshine House, considering how many times i listened to yours, just some boys, maybe if i use that tag enough times i'll singlehandedly canonize it, peyton are you getting my Vibes i am sending them to you, poetic bullshit, tattoo kisses :), telling each other how much they love each other, the only thing that matters lbr, the usual, there's one line in here for peyton, this isn't a songfic but it's not NOT a songfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-13
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-13 00:28:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,382
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29393385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellawritess/pseuds/bellawritess
Summary: Jack is quiet. The night is not. It’s full of subtle sounds, animals or insects Alex can’t identify, humming noises from things that keep the house functioning, Jack’s heartbeat under him. Alex knows few things like the back of his hand, but one of those is this heartbeat, even though he knows it’s impossible to tell one heartbeat from another. It’s just he doesn’t think he’d ever botherlisteningif it wasn’t Jack’s. And maybe that’s how he knows. Not that he could tell this unbroken pulse from any other, but that he’d only ever care to hear this one.
Relationships: Jack Barakat/Alex Gaskarth
Comments: 8
Kudos: 16





	thank god i'm yours

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [but it’s clear when it hits me](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28004442) by [yellingatbabylon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yellingatbabylon/pseuds/yellingatbabylon). 



> have you ever read [sam](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yellingatbabylon)'s [pretty venom fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28004442)? if not i encourage you, or maybe beg you, to go and read that now. either before or in place of this. i read it last night and it made me want to write something with similar vibes. so shoutout to sam as well as meghna for giving me many suggestions of things to write which, of course, i completely ignored and then wrote this instead. while listening to yours - wedding edition by russell dickerson a whole lot of times. i am TELLING you man. country boys who love their wives fucking invented love!!!!!!!!!
> 
> would like to write a very short love letter to sam right now because i've already told her what i think about her writing, especially in pretty venom fic, and it's not like she doesn't know, but much like alex with jack, i cannot help but repeat myself as often as possible. sam. i love your writing. it is incredible. if you've ever read a fic by sam YOU WILL KNOW that she has this magical ability to bring universes to LIFE with these extra hints of description i would never think to include that make an imaginary world feel real and i am constantly in awe of it. everyone has strengths in writing and i think there's a nice bit of poetry in knowing that our strengths complement each other. i know that this fic is not a sam fic, but i hope that you can sense the sam influence in it, because i certainly felt it while i was writing it. okay i've gone on long enough and my inner monologue right now sounds like prue from bake off which means i definitely have been watching too MUCH bake off so i gotta go 
> 
> anyway i'm not gonna tell you how many times i listened to yours - wedding edition because paige might have a conniption but it was many. accordingly the title is from that song as well and i strongly recommend listening to it on repeat til you finish the fic for optimal fic reading experience

Alex is sitting at the kitchen table, half-asleep with his cheek resting on his hand. The words had been coming quick to him and then he’d abruptly run out of steam, and he’s still sitting here in case they come back even though most of him doesn’t expect that they will. Another few minutes and he’s probably going to call it a night. A part of him is worried that he’ll never get back into whatever mindset had brought him these lyrics in the first place, but more often than not he gets there eventually. Patience is a virtue Alex has worked a long time to achieve. He’s still not great with it.

A creaking floorboard pulls him out of his hazy state. He doesn’t turn, and doesn’t need to; a moment later there’s a hand rubbing his shoulders, a quiet voice saying, “Alex?”

Alex sighs because he’s not always sure what else to do in response to Jack. There certainly aren’t words for the feeling Jack gives him. “Hi.”

“Still writing?” Jack asks, his hand moving to brush knuckles against Alex’s face. Alex leans into the gentle touch.

“I think I’m done,” he says defeatedly. “For tonight, I mean.”

“Done with the notebook, anyway,” Jack says, hugging Alex from behind and pressing their cheeks together. “You’re always writing in here.” He taps a finger to Alex’s temple.

“Everyone’s always writing, in that case,” Alex says. “That’s just called an internal monologue.”

Jack hums. “Well then yours is a whole lot smarter than mine. Or at least you know more words than me.”

The latter might be true, but the former definitely not. “Don’t talk about yourself like that,” Alex says, though he’s pretty sure Jack is joking. Already the lyrics he’s written tonight are slipping his mind, but when he glances down at the notebook before closing it he thinks maybe they’re on the sadder side. They won’t sound sad when there are grinding guitars and racing rhythms underneath them, but right now, raw in Alex’s handwriting, they’re kind of sad.

“I’m joking,” Jack says. “Hey, you wanna go outside? Stargaze?”

Alex blinks as he pushes the notebook away from him. “Yeah,” he says. He’s tired, but he’ll be tired anyway. May as well be tired under the stars with his boy. His Jack. His everything. Whatever Jack is to him.

Jack presses a kiss against the side of his head and tangles a hand with Alex’s. He pulls Alex around on the swiveling chair and graciously helps him out of it. Their hands swing between them as Jack pulls them to the front door in the ambling pace of someone with absolutely nowhere to be and no reason to rush.

The chill outside skims over the exposed skin on Alex’s neck. With his free hand he pulls up his hood. The desert is one of those places that should be impossible: hot during the day and cold at night, both halves of the day behaving as if the other half doesn’t exist. Like his and Jack’s hands linked together, cold on the outside from the weather but warm between their palms. 

Science has explained the desert. Maybe there’s an explanation for the two of them. Maybe Alex doesn’t care to know it. Maybe the mystery is half the magic.

“Hope you don’t care about these clothes,” Jack comments in passing as they slow down over the grass in front of the house. “Don’t know the last time this was vacuumed.”

Alex huffs a laugh. “Last time the grass was vacuumed?”

“Yes,” Jack says. He lies down, pulling Alex with him, so Alex leans his head back onto Jack’s stomach, though it means their hands are separated. Worth it, though, when Jack’s hands immediately move to Alex’s hair instead. “Wow.”

Alex looks up at the sky, registering the stars for the first time since they’d come outside. And…yeah. _Wow_ is really the only way to describe it. For once, Alex doesn’t want to say anything more. The mottled starlight makes it look like the world is encased in glitter. It’s the kind of thing Alex could and would willingly gaze at for hours.

“Kinda makes me want to stay here,” Jack says softly. His fingers graze Alex’s scalp as he brushes through unruly hair. And all of a sudden Alex is tempted to close his eyes, because as much as they’re outside to look at the stars, Alex is content with his head against Jack’s stomach and Jack’s gentle touch. 

For a moment he does. Just long enough to take a deep breath. Then he opens them again and drinks it all in, the sky full of stars and Jack on the ground. Alex isn’t religious, but if heaven exists, it must be close to this. Having something as wonderful as Jack on Earth is more than enough of a gift, but to have constellations littering Alex’s sky as well is too good to be true. If any human being deserves this many good things, it certainly isn’t Alex.

Though that won’t stop Alex from enjoying every second.

“Yeah,” he belatedly answers. Jack laughs quietly.

“Distracted?”

“You can’t take me stargazing and then laugh if I get distracted by stargazing,” Alex insists. 

Jack tugs lightly at his hair. “I wasn’t laughing at you,” he says, a smile coloring his voice.

“You were.” Alex reaches over his head, grabbing one of Jack’s hands and linking their fingers together as much as he can from this angle. “That’s okay. You’re forgiven, because this is really nice.”

“Yeah,” Jack says. His voice has gone a little pensive again. “You think if you lived someplace like this, you’d ever get used to it?”

“The stars?”

“Yeah. We always get used to the things that make a place magical. Don’t you think?”

Alex hums. He’d like to believe he would never get used to the privilege of having the galaxy in his backyard, but Jack is right. Nice things become standard after long enough. 

Most things do. Not all.

“Dunno,” he says dimly. “Maybe. Part of the magic is that we don’t always get to have it, right?”

“Exactly,” says Jack. “But I’m happy we get to have it now, at least.”

There are things Alex has never grown used to, though. Magical parts of his life that will never fail to steal his breath or stop his heart for a beat.

One of them has his fingers intertwined with Alex’s right now.

“When did you become such an astronomy boy?” Alex teases, rolling onto his side and shuffling over to rest his cheek on Jack’s chest. Jack peers at him over their linked arms. The corner of his mouth quirks up.

“I didn’t,” he says. “I like it ‘cause you do.”

Alex feels it happen. The heart-stopping moment.

“Oh,” he says hoarsely. This time he really does close his eyes. “I forgot that sometimes you do things because you love me.”

“Sometimes?” Jack chuckles. “I do everything because I love you, Alex.”

Breathless.

“I’m pretty sure that’s how it works,” Jack continues. “That when you love someone it kinda becomes part of everything you do? Either that or I’m doing it super wrong.”

“Doesn’t feel wrong to me,” Alex murmurs, squeezing Jack’s hand. “So feel free to carry on as you were.”

“That was the plan.”

Alex lets the atmosphere slowly wash over him. It’s heavy with the paradox of the occasion; he’s gone from writing sad lyrics to feeling like he’ll never be happier, and he’d been happy to write about being sad and now he’s almost sad to feel this happy. 

“When’s the last time I told you how much you mean to me?” he mumbles. He can’t remember, which either means he’s too tired or it’s been too long. Or both. The question isn’t really rhetorical, but he doesn’t wait for Jack to answer. “I don’t…I don’t think I tell you enough. Maybe I should let you read the stuff that doesn’t make it to the demo stage. Or maybe I should just tell you more often. I don’t take you for granted, but I don’t tell you enough.”

“You tell me a lot.”

Does he? It doesn’t feel that way. It doesn’t feel like enough, no matter how much Alex actually says it. “Well then I’m telling you again,” he says. His eyes flutter open and Jack is smiling to himself, gaze trained on the sky. 

Fleetingly, overwhelmingly, Alex wonders how anyone could look at the sky when Jack is right there.

Jack can’t look at himself, but he picks up his head and looks down at Alex, which is maybe the second-best option. “You don’t have to, you know. I know whether you say it or not.”

“But you’ll know better if I say it more.”

“That you love me?” Jack drops his head onto the grass again, sweeping his thumb over the back of Alex’s hand. The other hand has stilled in his hair; now it starts back up again, scratching delicately over Alex’s scalp. “Don’t feel like you have to.”

“It’s not a burden to tell you I love you, Jack,” Alex says, smiling. “Or to tell you that you’re my guiding light and the reason I strive to be a better man every day. Or that when I feel like I have nothing to hold onto I always have you.”

“Al,” Jack sighs, like he’s whispering it to the stars instead of to Alex.

“You mean a lot to me, that’s all. Not trying to get emo or anything, I just…yeah. Think you’re the best thing I’ve got.”

Jack is quiet. The night is not. It’s full of subtle sounds, animals or insects Alex can’t identify, humming noises from things that keep the house functioning, Jack’s heartbeat under him. Alex knows few things like the back of his hand, but one of those is this heartbeat, even though he knows it’s impossible to tell one heartbeat from another. It’s just he doesn’t think he’d ever bother _listening_ if it wasn’t Jack’s. And maybe that’s how he knows. Not that he could tell this unbroken pulse from any other, but that he’d only ever care to hear this one.

Whatever he and Jack have, words don’t cover it. They communicate in close approximations, tender touches, lips to knuckles or fingers linked or smiles that feel like sunshine in the middle of the night. Alex wouldn’t want it with anyone else, and it’s just luck that Jack doesn’t either.

There wouldn’t be a point to calling it anything other than _Alex and Jack._ To try and define it would be to diminish it.

After a minute has passed, Jack exhales. His chest dips. “We should go to sleep. Always tomorrow to stargaze.”

He doesn’t even need to say it. Alex gets it loud and clear from this — from _always tomorrow to stargaze_ , from Jack bringing them outside to stare out at a universe he doesn’t understand just because he knows Alex likes to, and from offering to go again tomorrow because he knows Alex is too tired to take full advantage the way he normally would. It’s there in Jack’s words even if none of the letters match up; this _I-love-you-too_ is crystal clear.

There’s always tomorrow until there isn’t. Until they leave. Already Alex is starting to take it for granted, without even meaning to. Shit. “Tomorrow,” he agrees. Tomorrow he won’t be taken by surprise and halfway to drifting off. Drowsy and in love.

(If nothing else, he must be in love. That’s what people call it when what they mean is it’s indescribable.)

“Come on, boy,” Jack says. Somehow they move in sync, standing up together. Alex trips, unbalanced, into Jack’s chest, and Jack just laughs and holds him in a hug. Alex wraps his arms around Jack’s waist. This is where he fits best into the world: with his arms around Jack. 

They’re quiet as they re-enter the house, breathing twin sighs of relief at the warmth inside. The sleepiness held at bay by the cool air all rushes back at once. It’s a miracle Alex makes it upstairs at all, mostly thanks to Jack’s guiding touch, the halfway hug still inhabiting them both.

He leads them into his own room but Alex doesn’t even bother pretending like he intends to leave. Jack seems to know this, too; he doesn’t blink when Alex crawls into bed after him, although he does smile a little. Alex pulls Jack into his chest, hands meeting around Jack’s front where Jack curls his fingers around Alex’s palms.

If Alex ever doubted his place in the universe, lying here with Jack would set him straight. _Someone_ has to hold him like it’s the only thing keeping them from drowning, and Alex is the best man for the job.

Jack turns, tilting his head towards Alex. “You mean a lot to me too, y’know.”

Warmth spreads through Alex. It’s a different kind than the one that had greeted them at the door. A better kind. “Thank God for that.”

Jack’s smile grows just a touch. “You’re the best thing I’ve got,” he adds, bringing Alex’s hand to his mouth and kissing the faded red rose. “But don’t let it go to your head. I tell that to all the girls.”

“I bet you do.”

“Write anything good tonight?”

“Dunno,” Alex hums. “Don’t remember what it was.”

“That’ll make it hard to play,” Jack says lightly. “I’m sure it’ll come back to you.”

“Yeah, probably tomorrow.” Alex leans in, softly brushing his lips against Jack’s. “Love you.”

Jack smiles. “Love you.”

He turns away and Alex leaves a lingering kiss on the concentric triangles inked under Jack’s ear, then another for good measure where his neck slopes into his shoulder. At last he settles his head on the pillow and closes his eyes.

Sleep comes easy. Everything comes easy with Jack. Gratitude swirls up around Alex and tugs his lips into a smile as his breathing slows, and he murmurs something like _thank God_ or _I love you_ or maybe _thank God I love you_ , even though he knows he’s saying the wrong name.

It’s another thing that comes easy with Jack: a love so steadfast it replaces religion.

**Author's Note:**

> :) i'm on tumblr [@clumsyclifford](https://clumsyclifford.tumblr.com/) come say hi !! leave a comment if you liked, THAT would mean a lot to ME okay love you bye x


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